Opportunity for Increase of its Market Share
Following
Realignments in the Greek Oil Products Market
The Chief Executive Officer of Aegean Oil, Mr. Iakovos Melissanidis,
speaks about the realignment in the Greek oil products market and
Aegean’s prospects for development.
The oil products sector has witnessed
historic landmarks during
the long period that oil companies
have perated in Greece, which
have left their imprint on the development
of this market. For example, in
1992, after a long period when a market
decree was in effect specifying the margin
of all players, and which resulted
in operating losses for most of the oil
trading companies in the decade of the
80s and in the departure of multinationals
such as Fina, Εsso and Total from
Greece, the market was liberalized.
The expectations of the sector then
were that the
companies would have the
opportunity, in a free market,
to specify
their margins and become profitable.
The time was historic, competition
began to exist, possibly for the first time,
in the sector of oil products, and unprecedented
conditions started to take
shape for companies and gas stations
owners. Under these conditions, the
multinationals Mobil, in the beginning,
and Texaco later, left the Greek market.
The first merged with ΒΡ and the second
was bought out by Shell. Also, the
Greek-interest companies Mamidakis
and Elda-E were respectively bought
out by and merged into Hellenic Petroleum,
a state company, which also owns
the national refineries.
In the decade since 2000, and in an
intensely competitive environment,
Aegean Oil was founded and began its
operation. Aegean Oil: a wholly Greek company, for which, in its first steps,
most competitors saw no future. The
bolder ones stated it would “burst.” A
company established from ‘white paper,’
in extremely demanding conditions,
regarding knowledge, experience, capital,
and reliability, and which, finally,
against all forecasts, managed in a record
time to occupy third place in market
sales, and invalidate all forecasts.
Today, in 2009, developments are
dramatic. Two Greek companies of
the sector, El-Petrol and Sunoil have
suspended their operation and a third,
Dracoil, has ceded part of its percentage.
The last two multinationals, BP
and Shell, were bought out by Hellenic
Petroleum and Motor Oil, respectively,
and all this since the beginning of this
year. Today, all the companies in the oil
products sector are of Greek interests
and the conditions being shaped create
the circumstances for serious realignment.
The time is once again historic
and possibly unique, in the sense that
the international giants of the sector are
departing. ‘Players’ with a huge international
experience and deep knowledge
of their field, are exiting the “game”
and the market remains in the hands of
Greek companies.
Εκο, a Hellenic Petroleum subsidiary,
holds first place in the sector,
after the buy out of Εlda-Ε, Mamidakis
and ΒΡ, which resulted from the
buying out of Fina and the merger of
Mobil—meaning Eko holds first place after the buy out of five trading companies.
Moτor Oil today holds second
place, as the mother
company of the
two trading companies, Avin and Shell,
with
Shell including the percentage of
Texaco following its acquisition.
Aegean is now in the third place in
the market, and it is the only
company
of the three first companies whose market
share is the result of
one and only
one company, and
which has achieved
this status in
less than ten years. Aegean,
we
must remember,
has not resulted
through an acquisition. In essence, Aegean
began in 2000, securing a trading
license, and gas station by
gas station,
instituted an unprecedented policy of
growth and development in the sector’s
history, Today Aegean can proudly
boast that it is the ‘third pylon’ in the oil products sector. The year 2009 still
has a way to go. The companies of the
sector are careful to place themselves in
this market under the new onditions,
having expectations to benefit from
potential developments. What is certain
is that Aegean, which is the ‘definition’
of development, and has proven
this in recent years, has as its target to
recruit approximately 150 gas stations,
mainly from the ompanies that have
been bought out or eparted. Already,
during recent weeks it has recruited 15
Shell gas stations, some in Athens, in
Crete, in Livadia, in Nafpaktos, and is
very optimistic. To date, Aegean’s results
have, in broad terms, met or exceeded
its targets, and consequently it is
certain that it will be the company most
favored by current developments.
Aegean is now in the third place in
